Pursuant to a circular issued by the MFSA on the 5th February 2013, the MFSA and the Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit have determined that all regulated collective investment schemes in Malta, the units or shares in which are offered to or placed with investors, whether directly or indirectly, by the scheme itself or by other thus parties on behalf of the scheme, are required to appoint an Anti-Money Laundering Reporting Officer (MLRO).

This represents a change in the interpretation of the criteria establishing whether a scheme is subject to the anti money laundering legislation. In the case where collective investment schemes have a limited physical operational setup in Malta, the duties of the MLRO may be outsourced to the MLRO of the administrator of the Scheme. In this case, the reporting obligations of the scheme may be carried out by the MLRO of the administrator. Transitory provisions for schemes that do not have an MLRO have been put in place – such funds are required to comply with this requirement by the 30th April 2013.